


The World Won't Fall

by ADreamIsASoftPlaceToLand



Category: The Penumbra Podcast
Genre: Arguments, Blood and Injury, Hurt/Comfort, Injury, Lizard Kissin' Tuesday (Penumbra Podcast), Other, Second Citadel (Penumbra Podcast), Stitches, Whump, idk if i've used that tag before
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-08
Updated: 2020-12-08
Packaged: 2021-03-09 21:08:10
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,514
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27952850
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ADreamIsASoftPlaceToLand/pseuds/ADreamIsASoftPlaceToLand
Summary: Rilla is tired of Damien ignoring the doctor's orders.
Relationships: Lord Arum/Sir Damien/Rilla (Penumbra Podcast)
Comments: 12
Kudos: 61





	The World Won't Fall

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Jaeh](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Jaeh/gifts).



> tw: description of injury, some blood, and stitches
> 
> requested by @Jaeh on AO3! hope you enjoy! :3c
> 
> title from Take Care of Yourself by Maisie Peters

Arum is in Amaryllis’s kitchen, warming up a pot of water, when he hears the shouting. Well, it isn’t really shouting so much as a shift in tone, the herbalist’s voice snapping through the wall that separates them, followed by a tense silence. Arum pulls the pot from the fire and carries it gingerly through the door into their workroom. Amaryllis has busied herself with preparing the supplies she’ll need to restitch Damien’s wounds. The air is thick with silence and barely suppressed anger. Arum can hear it in the way Amaryllis’s breath is deliberately measured and even, in the way she sets down her supplies with a sharp thunk on her table.

Damien flinches at the noise, and Arum instinctively moves closer, setting the pot of water on the table and reaching up to squeeze the poet’s shoulder gently. “Honeysuckle?”

The poet hisses in a breath and leans slightly into his touch, but doesn’t speak, eyeing the herbalist warily. Arum shifts his hand on the little knight’s shoulder, skimming it up his neck and running his fingers gently through the curls at the base of his neck. As he feels the poet relax into the contact, he turns his gaze to the herbalist, who is wetting a cloth in the bowl he brought. “Amaryllis?”

Amaryllis wrings out the cloth with perhaps a bit more force than necessary. “It’s fine. Nothing. Don’t worry about it.”

Damien speaks before he can, his voice wavering, “Rilla, I…”

“Stop,” Amaryllis says, her voice firm. “I don’t want to hear it right now. Don’t move, I need to get these sewn back up before you rip them even further open.”

“Amaryllis,” Arum says slowly, already feeling like he’s testing the boundaries of this conversation. It isn’t often that the herbalist gets truly angry. _Frustrated_ , occasionally. With an experiment or a problem she cannot immediately solve, but it is rarely directed at a person. He’s occasionally seen her snap at that ridiculous _brother_ of hers, but for that he can hardly blame her.

“ _What_ , Arum?” Amaryllis snaps, her hands curling tight around the cloth she’d been raising to clean the long gashes across Damien’s chest. “I have to clean this before it gets _infected_ , and stop the bleeding before he bleeds out all over my exam room.”

The poet flinches again, his gaze flicking down to his chest, where three long gashes are still dripping blood, and Arum wraps and arm gently around Damien’s back. “Anger will not _help_ , right now, Amaryllis. Our poet is in need of your healing, not your ire.”

“Well, see, that’s the _thing_ , isn’t it?” Amaryllis says, and her voice is as stilted as the smile that splits itself across her face. “I already _did_ the whole _healing_ thing, but Damien decided that, instead of bed-rest and refraining from training for a week while the stitches closed up, he was just gonna go _right_ back to work and reopen his stitches, probably making his injuries even worse than they would’ve been if he’d just left them alone! So- y’know. He wouldn’t _need_ my healing if he’d just _listened_ in the first place.”

Damien has shrunk in on himself, so small he looks almost like a child, perched up on Rilla’s exam table, and Arum can feel how he has stiffened beneath the arm he’s draped over the poet’s back. As the little knight takes in a shuddering breath, Arum’s heart stutters in sympathy. He hates seeing Damien crumple like this, under the weight of all his fears and failures, but to know that it is _Amaryllis_ who- who has _caused_ this change in the poet’s stature is… Surprising. And it sparks a kind of anger Arum is… unused to feeling. He feels- _protective_ , as he steps forward in front of the little knight, looking sharply down his nose at the herbalist.

“Amaryllis, that will not _help_. You have upset the poet enough for one night, I think,” he says, his voice a low growl in the quiet room.

Amaryllis scoffs. “Yeah. _He’s_ the one who’s upset.”

Arum _does_ growl then, low and fierce, as frustration and anger snap in his chest like a brittle twig, and Amaryllis stiffens, her eyes dropping to the ground between them. They stand there for a moment, frozen in the tense silence, before Amaryllis’s shoulders slump. “I’m sorry, it just-“ she takes a step closer, and Arum backs off so she can stand in front of Damien again, satisfied with the way her tone has softened, “I shouldn’t have snapped at you.”

She takes Damien’s face in her hands, and lifts it gently to meet his eyes. Arum stands to the side, but lets his claws drift softly over the knight’s back, his heart twingeing at the way Damien’s breath is still hitching and stuttering in his chest. Amaryllis runs her thumbs gently over his cheeks. “I’m sorry, I’m just worried about you, ok? I’m not mad. I just want you to take care of yourself. You’re _hurt_ and if you keep going like this you’re going to hurt yourself _worse_ and I-“

She cuts off for a moment, and Arum can see the pain she’s pushing down to say this, to acknowledge that she’s feeling this way to begin with. “I don’t want to _lose_ you, Damien.”

“Oh, my heart, my Rilla…“ Damien’s voice is thick with tears. Emotion comes so easily to the little poet, something that has always baffled Arum. With Amaryllis it is… Different. Her emotions are more subtle. Stated matter-of-fact rather than _shown_ , the way their poet is effusive and overflowing with them. Arum… Arum is not good at either of these things. He’s never had to _communicate_ his emotions the way his humans do, and it it is a process that he learns more and more each day. He is _so lucky_ , to be allowed to see how these two humans love each other, and to be loved by them in turn. To _love them_ , in turn. Arum is not good at expressing himself, but he tries, anyway.

“It is not your _fault_ , little honeysuckle,” Arum murmurs, leaning gently to nuzzle his snout into the poet’s hair. “We… We love you. We want you to stay _safe_.”

Damien whimpers out a broken little noise. “I did not mean to- to _worry_ you, I- I simply thought that I could do it. I have pushed through worse before…”

Amaryllis huffs a wry laugh. “You were ignoring doctor’s orders then, too, y’know.”

Damien winces, “It seems… I have a habit of ignoring the wishes of those who wish only to help.”

“You’re stronger than a lot of people would give you credit for,” Amaryllis admits, and Arum remembers their first duel, how he’d been so confident in the ease with which he could slay this little human. He was small, smaller even than Rilla, and slight as the arrows he drew from his quiver. But he was _quick_ , and clever, and… And he’d beaten Arum at his own game. “But it also isn’t _weakness_ to hold back sometimes. To not push yourself when you need to recover.”

Amaryllis presses a gentle kiss to his forehead. “You’ll still be the strongest knight in the Second Citadel, once you’ve _healed,_ okay?”

When Damien nods, looking chastised but no longer _panicked_ , she grins, and then steps back a bit to look at his chest again. “Alright, let’s get this fixed.”

Arum holds Damien, carding claws gently through dark curls, as the herbalist cleans the wounds and redoes his stitches, bumping his snout against Damien’s cheek as she finishes, nudging a gentle smile onto the little knight’s face. Amaryllis rubs a healing salve over his skin, and then Arum scoops the poet up into his arms. “Now, I think it is time for you to _rest_ , little poet.”

Damien blinks owlishly up at him. “I- Lord Arum, I am _perfectly_ capable of walking to bed.”

Arum simply tugs the man closer, letting a smug grin spread across his face, “And _I_ am perfectly capable of carrying you.”

Damien presents no opposition to this statement, merely shifts so he can rest his head against one of Arum’s shoulders. Arum carries the little human to bed, and deposits him gently on top of the covers, careful not to bump against his chest. He then crawls into bed beside Damien, and nuzzles affectionately into his neck. “Are you in pain?” He asks, his voice nearly too soft to hear.

“No, my lily,” his poet replies, and Arum hums his satisfaction. He traces the lines of Damien’s body with one claw, grinning at the way it makes him shiver. He presses a kiss to Damien’s collarbone, leaves a trail of kisses up his neck and jaw, to his cheek.

Amaryllis will join them in a few minutes, to offer some kisses of her own, to offer what comfort she can to their knight. But for now, Arum pulls the poet close and whispers like he’s offering a secret, though it is one that has been known for some time. “I love you, honeysuckle.”

**Author's Note:**

> come find me on tumblr @shorter-than-her-tbr-pile


End file.
